Abstract

The SAGE Handbook of Gender and Education brings together leading scholars on gender and education to provide an up-to-date and broad-ranging guide to the field. It is a comprehensive overview of different theoretical positions on equity issues in schools. The contributions cover all sectors of education from early years to higher education; curriculum subjects; methodological and theoretical perspectives; and gender identities in education. Each chapter reviews, synthesises, and provides a critical interrogation of key contemporary themes in education. This approach ensures that the book will be an indispensable source of reference for a wide range of readers: students, academics and practitioners.

Copyright

Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form, or by any means, only with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

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ISBN-10 1-4129-0792-6 ISBN-13 978-1-4129-0792-7

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[Page v]

Introduction

The SAGE Handbook of Gender and Education brings together leading scholars on gender and education to provide an up-to-date and broad-ranging guide to the field. It is a comprehensive overview of different theoretical positions on equity issues in schools. The contributions cover all sectors of education from early years to higher education; curriculum subjects; methodological and theoretical perspectives; and gender identities in education. Each chapter reviews, synthesizes, and provides a critical interrogation of key contemporary themes in education. This approach ensures that the book will be an indispensable source of reference for a wide range of readers: students, academics and practitioners.

The first section of the Handbook, Gender Theory and Methodology, outlines the various feminist perspectives on researching and exploring gender and education. The section critiques the notion of gender as a category in educational research and considers recent trends, evident especially in the gender and underachievement debates, to locate gender difference solely within biology. This section provides the broad background upon which the issues and debates in the other sections can be situated.

Section two, Gender and Education, considers the differing ways in which gender has been shown to impact upon the opportunities and experiences of pupils/students, teachers, and other adults in the different sectors of education. It also includes a chapter on single-sex schooling.

Section three, Gender and School Subjects, comprises chapters that cover gender issues within the teaching and learning of particular school subjects (for example, math, literacy, and science). It also includes topics such as sex education and assessment. The chapters in section four, Gender, Identity and Educational Sites, address up-to-date issues which have a long history in terms of explorations into gender and educational opportunities. More recent inclusions in the debates, such as disability, sexuality, and masculinities are discussed alongside the more traditional concerns of ‘race’, social class, and femininities.

The final section, Working in Schools and Colleges, illuminates the working lives of teachers and academics. The chapters cover such topics as school culture, career progression and development, and the gendered identities of professionals within educational institutions.

The contributors to this book have been selected by the editors as authorities in their specific area of gender and education and are drawn from the international scholarly community.

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Acknowledgements

[Page ix]

We wish to thank all those who have contributed to making this collection such a powerful statement of the field of gender and education. We are grateful to Marianne Lagrange of Sage for commissioning the project and to her and Emma Grantmills for their support throughout. We particularly wish to thank Professor Miriam David for chairing the Review Panel, and indeed the consultants whose expert advice and guidance has ensured the high quality of this volume. And, finally, we thank our family and friends for their patience and encouragement during the book's production.

List of Contributors

[Page xii]

Sandra Acker is a Professor in the Department of Sociology and Equity Studies, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto. She has worked in the United States, Britain and Canada. She is a sociologist of education, with interests in gender and education, teachers' work and higher education. Her book publications include Gendered Education (Open University Press, 1994), The Realities of Teachers' Work: Never a Dull Moment (Continuum, 1999), and (co-edited with Elizabeth Smyth and others) Challenging Professions: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives on Women's Professional Work (University of Toronto Press, 1999). Recent research has considered the spread of the research culture and its impact on academics in faculties of education; gender and academic leadership in Australia, Britain and Canada; and the tenure process in Canadian universities.

Madeleine Arnot is Professor of Sociology of Education, Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge University, and the Academy of Social Sciences. She has published extensively on gender, class and education, social change and equality policy making. Her current research focuses on gender values in relation to democracy and citizenship education, education for all and poverty alleviation, and refugee education. Her recent publications include Closing the Gender Gap: Postwar Education and Social Change, with M. David and G. Weiner (Polity Press, 1999); Challenging Democracy: International Perspectives on Gender, Education and Citizenship (co-edited with J. Dillabough, RoutledgeFalmer, 2000); Reproducing Gender? Essays on Feminist Theory and Educational Politics (RoutledgeFalmer, 2002); and Gender and Education Reader (with M. Mac an Ghaill, Routledge, 2005)

Jo Boaler is an Associate Professor at Stanford University, specializing in mathematics education and gender. She is a former secondary-school teacher of mathematics and has taught in diverse, London inner-city comprehensive schools. [Page xiii]Her PhD dissertation won the national award for educational research in the UK, and she is the author of numerous articles and four books. Dr Boaler specializes in the impact of different mathematics teaching approaches upon student understanding, achievement and equity. Her book, Experiencing School Mathematics, won the Outstanding Book of the Year award for education in Britain. Her latest book, with Cathy Humphreys, Connecting Mathematical Ideas, is a collection of video cases and accompanying lesson notes and analyses.

Nancy Brickhouse is Professor and Associate Director of the School of Education at the University of Delaware. Her writings on gender and science education have been published in a variety of outlets, including Journal for Research in Science Teaching, Journal of Curriculum Studies and Science Education, and in International Handbook of Science Education, edited by Ken Tobin and Barry Fraser, and published by Kluwer. She has recently completed a project with Danielle Ford, ‘Bringing Young Girls into Science’, funded by the National Science Foundation.

Angela Calabrese Barton, is an expert in urban science education, and feminism and science education. She received her PhD in curriculum, teaching and educational policy from Michigan State University in 1995. Her work has been published in Educational Researcher, American Education Research Journal, Educational Policy and Practice, Journal of Research in Science Teaching, Science Education, and Curriculum Inquiry, among others. Her most recent book, Teaching Science for Social Justice (Teachers College Press), won the 2003 AESA Critics Choice Award. Her other recent book, Re/thinking Scientific Literacy, won the 2005 AERA Division K Award for Exemplary Research.

Bagele Chilisa is an Associate Professor at the University of Botswana. Her research focus is on educational policies, gender, research methodologies and indigenous knowledge systems. She has co-authored the following books: Gender, HIV/AIDS and Life Skills Education in Community Junior Secondary Schools in Botswana (UNICEF, Nairobi) and Gendered School Experiences: Impact on Retention and Achievement, in Botswana and Ghana (DFID, London). Some of her work appears in Gender and Education Journal (UK) 2002, 14(1): 21–35; International Journal of Educational Development (UK) 2001, 21(5): 433–46; Transformation, the Journal of Inclusive Scholarship and Pedagogy (USA) 2001, X(11): 115–16; International Journal of Educational Assessment (UK) 2000, 7(1): 61–81; and International Journal of Qualitative Studies (USA) 2005, vol. 18(6): 659–84.

R.W. Connell is University Professor in the Faculty of Education and Social Work, University of Sydney. Author or co-author of Ruling Class Ruling [Page xiv]Culture, Class Structure in Australian History, Making the Difference, Gender and Power, Schools and Social Justice, Masculinities, The Men and the Boys and Gender. R. W. Connell is past president of the Sociological Association of Australia and New Zealand, and a contributor to journals in sociology, education, political science, gender studies and related fields. Current research concerns gender equity, globalization and intellectuals, and social theory on a world scale.

Professor Bronwyn Davies was appointed to the School of Education at the University of Western Sydney in 2003 and is Chair of the Narrative Discourse and Pedagogy Research Group. She is well known for her work on gender and classroom research and her writing on aspects of post-structuralist theory. More recently, she has been working on body/landscape relations, critical literacy and a critique of neo-liberalism as it impacts on subjectivities at work. Recent books include Gender in Japanese Preschools. Frogs and Snails and Feminist Tales in Japan (Hampton Press, 2004); A Body of Writing 1989–1999 (Alta Mira Press, 2000); (Inscribing Body/landscape Relations (Alta Mira Press, 2000); second editions of Shards of Glass. Children Reading and Writing Beyond Gendered Identities (Hampton Press, 2003) and Frogs and Snails and Feminist Tales. Preschool Children and Gender (Hampton Press, 2003). Frogs and Snails has also recently been translated into Swedish by Christer Wallentin, as Hur flickor och pojkar gür kün.

Dr Kevin G. Davison is Lecturer in Education, and Research Development Coordinator, with the Department of Education, at the National University of Ireland, Galway. He teaches sociology of education for the Higher Diploma in Education program, as well as qualitative research methodologies for the postgraduate program. He currently researches and publishes in the area of masculinities, bodies, boys and literacies, as well as research methodologies in the postmodern condition. In addition to serving as guest co-editor on three special theme issues on boys, masculinity and education for Journal of Men's Studies, Canadian Journal of Education and McGill Journal of Education, he is co-editor, with Blye Frank, of a collection soon to be published by Althouse Press, Masculinities and Schooling: International Practices and Perspectives, and he is the author of the forthcoming book, Gender Gravity and the Postmodern Push: The Pressure of Gender and Bodies on Curriculum (Edwin Mellen Press).

Sara Delamont is Reader in Sociology at Cardiff University, where she has taught since 1976. She was the first woman to be president of BERA in 1984. Her historical research has focused on the education of clever women, using structuralist perspectives, and is presented in Knowledgable Women (1989). Her most recent book is Feminist Sociology (2003). She is currently doing an ethnography of capoeira teaching in the UK.

[Page xv]Jo-Anne Dillabough is an Associate Professor in the Department of Educational Studies; a Faculty Associate (2005–06) at the Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada; and a Spencer Research Fellow. Her co-edited book with Madeleine Arnot, published by RoutledgeFalmer, is Challenging Democracy: International Perspectives on Gender, Education and Citizenship (2000). She is also co-editor (with A.H. Halsey, H. Lauder and P. Brown) of Education, Globalization, and Social Change (in press, Oxford University Press). Her scholarly work has been concentrated in three interrelated areas of study. The first of these areas could be broadly described as the sociology of education and social theory, particularly in relation to critiques of democracy and the study of marginalized communities. The second area comprises the socio-cultural analysis of youth, economic disadvantage and social exclusion in Canada and cross-nationally. A third more recent interest is the relationship between youth exclusion, international human rights' issues and critical analyses of the law. Her approach across the entire corpus of this work could be characterized as that of a cultural sociologist specializing in microcultural sociological and qualitative approaches in the study of social inequality. Jo-Anne has published widely in the sociology of education, and was the recipient of the National Doctoral Award in Curriculum Studies for the most distinguished Canadian dissertation in that field. She currently holds two large-scale SSHRC (Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council) grants and a Spencer Foundation grant.

Jannette Elwood is Professor of Education at Queen's University, Belfast. Her research and teaching lie in the area of examinations and assessment. She has led nationally funded research projects into gender differences in UK examinations at 16+ and 18+. She advises UK and international policy makers and awarding bodies on the impact of assessment and testing systems on boys' and girls' performance. Her recent publications include ‘Gender and Achievement: What Have Exams Got to Do with It?’, Oxford Review of Education (2005) 31(2):1; and Equality Awareness in Teacher Education in Northern Ireland: Summary of Final Report (2004), published by the Equality Commission, Belfast (with P. McKeown, T. Gallagher, R. Kilpatrick, C. Murphy and K. Carlisle).

Debbie Epstein is Professor of Education at Cardiff School of Social Sciences. She has published widely on sexualities in educational settings. Her current research is on HIV/AIDS, gender and sexuality in southern Africa and also on globalization and higher education. Her most recent publications include Silenced Sexualities in Schools and Universities, co-authored with Sarah O'Flynn and David Telford, and The Academic's Support Kit (a boxed set of six books), co-authored with Rebecca Boden and Jane Kenway.

Becky Francis is Professor of Education at Roehampton University. Her research interests include the construction of social identities in education, [Page xvi]educational policy and social exclusion, feminist theory, and gender and achievement. Her recent authored books include Understanding Minority Ethnic Achievement: Race, Gender, Class and ‘Success’ (with Louise Archer, Routledge, 2006); Reassessing Gender and Achievement (with Christine Skelton, Routledge, 2005); and Boys, Girls and Achievement; Addressing the Classroom Issues (RoutledgeFalmer, 2000). Becky has also co-edited several readers concerning issues of theory and practice in gender and education.

Dr Blye W. Frank is Professor in the Division of Medical Education in the Faculty of Medicine at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. His research interests are in the areas of social justice; inequities in health care; social accountability in health; feminist, post-structural and queer theory; and masculinities and sexualities.

Jane Gaskell is Professor and Dean at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto. Her research on gender and education began with her thesis on young working-class women, their aspirations and their views of the women's movement. Her subsequent work on gender issues in education includes ‘The Women's Movement in Canadian and Australian Education: from Liberation and Sexism to Boys and Social Justice’ (with Sandra Taylor), Gender and Education, 2003, 15: 149–66; ‘White Women as Burden: on Playing the Role of Feminist ‘Experts’ in China’ (with Magrit Eichler), Women's Studies International Forum, 2000, 24: 1–15; Gender In/forms Curriculum: from Enrichment to Transformation (edited with John Willinsky, 1995, Teachers College Press); Gender Matters from School to Work (1991, Open University Press); and Women and Education (edited with Arlene McLaren, 1991, Detselig Publishers).

Professor Tuula Gordon is a Fellow and Deputy Director of the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies. Her research interests include young people's transitions, citizenship and nationality, gender, education and methodology. She has published in all these fields – for example, ‘Girls in Education: Citizenship, Agency and Emotions’ (Gender and Education, 2006, 18:1); Making Spaces: Citizenship and Difference in Schools, with Janet Holland and Elina Lahelma (Palgrave and New York University Press, 2000); Democratic Education: Ethnographic Challenges, with Dennis Beach and Elina Lahelma (eds) (Tufnell Press, 2003); ‘Imagining Gendered Adulthood: Anxiety, Ambivalence, Avoidance and Anticipation’, with Janet Holland, Elina Lahelma and Rachel Thomson (European Journal of Women's Studies, 2005, 12:1).

Dr Carole Leathwood is a Reader in Education in the Institute for Policy Studies in Education, London Metropolitan University. She specializes in research in post-compulsory education, with a particular interest in issues of gender, class and ‘race’, including the marketization of further education, gender and new [Page xvii]managerialism, widening participation in higher education, and critical analyses of educational policy. She is the Ireland/Britain editor of Women's Studies International Forum and an associate editor of Gender, Work and Organisation.

Diana Leonard is Professor of Sociology of Education and Gender at the Institute of Education, University of London. She has published extensively on the sociology of gender and the family, including Familiar Exploitation: A New Analysis of Marriage in Contemporary Western Societies (with C. Delphy, Polity, 1992, reprinted 1996), and has conducted research on ‘gender and learning’ among 10-year-olds, ‘violence resilient secondary schools’, ‘domestic responsibilities of 9–16-year-olds’ and, currently, the long-term consequences of single- and mixed-sex schooling. Her other interests include diversity in the experiences of doctoral students (see A Woman's Guide to Doctoral Studies, Open University Press, 2001)and a report on the experiences of international students in UK higher education for UKCOSA: The Council for International Education (2003).

Fengshu Liu is a PhD candidate at the University of British Columbia working on the topic, ‘Identity construction of rural women in today's China: a life history approach’. Before coming to the West and starting her journey as a social researcher, she was Dean of and teacher in the English department of a Chinese higher education institution. She co-edited several textbooks on English teaching and English writing during that period. Currently, her research interests include, inter alia, rural studies, gender studies, higher education, moral education, the only-child generation, identity politics and youth studies. In the past three years, she has published on basic education in China's rural areas, parental expectations of the only child, and Chinese culture and its implications for education.

Glenda MacNaughton has worked in the early childhood field for 30 years. She is currently an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Melbourne, where she established and now directs the Centre for Equity and Innovation in Early Childhood. Her years in early childhood have included work across all sectors as a practitioner and a manager, and she has been a senior policy adviser to government in the UK and Australia. Her most recently published book explored the politics of knowledge and activism in early childhood. She is currently researching how gender, class and race intersect and construct young children's learning; how teachers explore contemporary issues in the early childhood curriculum; and staff-parent relations in early childhood.

Professor Meg Maguire works in the Centre of Public Policy Research in the Department of Education and Professional Studies at King's College London. She teaches and researches issues of policy and practice in urban contexts, including social justice issues, teachers' lives, and age and ageism in education settings. She is also deputy editor of Journal of Education Policy.

[Page xviii]Catherine Marshall is Professor in the Department of Educational Leadership at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She writes about the politics of education, qualitative methodology, women's access to careers, and values in education. She is author or editor of numerous books, including Rethinking Educational Politics; Leadership for Social Justice: Making Revolutions in Education; Designing Qualitative Research; and Feminist Critical Policy Analysis, Vols I and II. AERA presented the Willystine Goodsell Award to Dr Marshall in 2003 for her career of scholarship and activism on behalf of women and girls. She heads Leadership for Social Justice, a grass-roots group pushing to put equity research into action. Her next book will be on educator activists.

Dr Wayne Martino is an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Western Ontario, Canada. He has been researching boys, masculinities and schooling for the past decade, and his work has been published in refereed journals in Australia, the UK, Canada and the USA. His book, So What's a Boy?: Addressing Issues of Masculinity and Schooling (with Maria Pallotta-Chiarolli, Open University Press, 2003), dealt specifically with documenting boys' experiences in Australian schools. He has published a range of books on boys, masculinities and schooling, including What About the Boys?: Issues of Masculinity and Schooling (with Bob Meyenn, Open University Press, 2001) and Boys' Stuff: Boys Talking About What Really Matters (with Maria Pallotta-Chiarolli, Allen & Unwin, 2001), as well as textbooks and source books for English teachers: Gendered Fictions (with Bronwyn Mellor, Chalkface Press, 1995); From the Margins: Exploring Ethnicity, Gender and Aboriginality (Fremantle Arts Centre Press, 1997); and Gender and Texts: A Professional Development Package for English Teachers (with Chris Cook, AATE, 1998). His latest books are ‘Being Normal is the Only Way to Be’: Adolescent Perspectives on Gender and School (with Maria Pallotta-Chiarolli, UNSW Press) and Gendered Outcasts and Sexual Outlaws (with Chris Kendall, Haworth Press).

David James Mellor is a doctoral student at Cardiff University School of Social Sciences. Working with an emphasis on subjectivity, dominance, culture and the everyday, his research focuses on gendered heterosexuality and the cultural pedagogies of heterosexuality. He is currently completing his thesis, which is about children's understandings of and investments in romance and romantic love.

Ann L. Mullen is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Toronto, Scarborough. She also currently holds a National Academy of Education/Spencer Postdoctoral Fellowship. Originally from California, she received a B.A. from the University of California at Berkeley and Master's and Doctorate degrees in sociology from Yale University. She has also studied in France and Brazil. Dr Mullen was awarded the American Educational Research Association Dissertation Fellowship and the Postdoctoral Research Fellowship. Before beginning her-current position, she served as a Senior Research Associate at the Institute of [Page xix]Educational Sciences at the US Department of Education. Her research focuses on several facets of the complex relationship between post-secondary education and social inequality, including enquiries into the importance of institution type and field of study as critical sorting mechanisms. Recent publications include ‘Who Goes to Graduate School?: Social and Academic Correlates of Educational Continuation after College,’ in Sociology of Education (with K.A. Goyette and J.A. Soares, 2003) and ‘Who Studies the Arts and Sciences? Social Background and the Choice and Consequences of Undergraduate Field of Study’ (with K.A. Goyette), forthcoming in the Journal of Higher Education.

Carrie Paechter is Professor of Education at Goldsmiths College, London. Her research interests include the intersection of gender, power and knowledge; the construction of identity, especially with regard to gender, space and embodiment in and outside schooling; and the processes of curriculum negotiation. She regards herself as a Foucaultian post-structuralist feminist in orientation and writes regularly on issues of research methodology in this context. Her latest book, Being Boys, Being Girls: Learning Masculinities and Femininities (Open University Press), will appear in 2007.

Diane Reay is Professor of Education at Cambridge University. She is a sociologist working in the area of education but is also interested in broader issues of the relationship between the self and society, the affective and the material. Her priority has been to engage in research with a strong social justice agenda that addresses social inequalities of all kinds. Her research has a strong theoretical focus, and she is particularly interested in developing theorizations of social class and the ways in which it is mediated by gender and ethnicity. Her most recent book, Degrees of Choice: Class, Race and Gender in Higher Education (with Miriam David and Stephen Ball, Trentham Books, 2005), employs a Bourdieurian analysis to look at inequalities in access and participation in higher education.

Dr Emma Renold is a senior lecturer in Childhood Studies at the Cardiff School of Social Sciences, Cardiff University. Her main research interests focus on young children's school-based gender and sexual identities, the identity work of children in residential care, gender-based bullying and sexual violence, and researching sensitive topics with children and young people (particularly participatory and visual methods). Some of these areas are explored in her recent book, Girls, Boys and Junior Sexualities (RoutledgeFalmer).

Jessica Ringrose is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the School of Social Sciences, Cardiff University. Her current research, funded through the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, focuses on femininity, class, ethnicity, and issues of aggression and bullying in popular culture and schooling. Her publications in this area can be found in Feminism and Psychology. She is also [Page xx]interested in students' experiences of grappling with race, class and gender-inclusive feminist pedagogies in higher education, and she has published on this theme in Resources for Feminist Research and Working Through Whiteness: International Perspectives (State University of New York Press).

Tracy Robinson-Wood is a Professor in the Department of Counseling and Applied Educational Psychology at Northeastern University. Her research focuses on the intersections of race, gender, culture, class and spirituality in psychosocial identity development. She is the author of the textbook, The Convergence of Race, Ethnicity, and Gender: Multiple Identities in Counseling. Her current research projects include a qualitative investigation of white mothers of non-white children, and resistance, coping and racial identity in young Black women.

Harilyn Rousso is President of Disabilities Unlimited Consulting Services, an organization that provides consultation, training and research on disability equity issues to promote equal opportunity for people with disabilities. An educator, social worker, psychotherapist, writer, painter and advocate, she has worked in the disability rights field, with a particular emphasis on issues of women and girls with disabilities, for more than 20 years. Ms Rousso is the founder of the Networking Project for Disabled Women and Girls of the YWCA/NYC, the executive producer of the documentary Positive Images: Portraits of Women with Disabilities, and the author of numerous publications on gender and disability, including Double Jeopardy. Addressing Gender Equity in Special Education (SUNY Press, 2001) and Strong Proud Sisters: Girls and Young Women with Disabilities (Center For Women Policy Studies, 2001).

Dr Sue Saltmarsh is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow working with the Narrative, Discourse and Pedagogy Research Group in the School of Education at the University of Western Sydney, Australia. Her research concerns the discursive production of subjectivities and social relations, with particular reference to issues of educational consumption, institutional violence and social justice. Her postdoctoral research focuses on the function of texts and textual practices in the gendered and racialized production of young people's subjectivities in the outer metropolitan region of Greater Western Sydney. Her PhD in critical and cultural studies was awarded the Macquarie University Vice Chancellor's Commendation and the Australian Association of Researchers in Education Doctoral Thesis Award 2005.

Jo Sanders is Director of the Center for Gender Equity in Camano Island, Washington, USA. She specializes in gender and technology issues in education. She has written many books, chapters and papers on the topic and has spoken widely in professional venues among educators in the USA and abroad. For more information, see her website at http://www.josanders.com.

[Page xxi]Tesha Sengupta-Irving, a former secondary mathematics teacher, is a doctoral candidate in mathematics education at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California. She is interested in how student collaboration can create more equitable and open conceptions of mathematics and how that promotes the engagement of historically marginalized student communities in the discipline.

Charol Shakeshaft, PhD, is Professor in the Department of Foundations, Leadership, and Policy Studies at Hofstra University, where she teaches courses on gender, statistical analysis, evaluation methodology, and school safety. Charol Shakeshaft has been studying equity in schools for more than 25 years, documenting gendered practice in the classroom and in school administration. She is an internationally recognized researcher in the area of gender patterns in educational delivery and classroom interactions. Her work on equity in schools has taken her into school systems across the USA, Australia, China, Japan, Canada and Europe, where she has helped educators make schools more welcoming to females. Dr Shakeshaft has recently completed a three-year national study of the relationships between a school-based risk prevention programme and risk behaviors of sixth to eighth-grade students and a three-year National Science Foundation project to promote interest in science careers among seventh- and eighth-grade girls, particularly girls of color from low-income families.

Christine Skelton is Professor of Education at Roehampton University and Director of the Centre for Research in Education Policy and Professionalism. Her research interests include the construction of gender identities in teachers and pupils in the primary and early years sectors. Her published works include Reassessing Gender and Achievement (with Becky Francis, Routledge, 2005); Boys and Girls in the Primary Classroom (edited with Becky Francis, Open University Press, 2003); and Schooling the Boys: Masculinities and Primary Education (OpenUniversity Press, 2001).

Lisa Smulyan is a Professor and Chair of the Department of Educational Studies at Swarthmore College, where she teaches courses in educational foundations; adolescence, gender and education; and school and society. Her work focuses on the role of gender in teachers' and administrators' personal and professional lives. Her most recent book is Balancing Acts: Women Principals at Work.

Elaine Unterhalter is a Senior Lecturer in Education and International Development at the Institute of Education, University of London, where she coordinates the masters degree in education, gender and international development. She is one of the coordinators of the Beyond Access project, which works with Oxfam GB and the Department for International Development (DFID) in the UK to generate and share new knowledge about the Millennium Development Goals, gender and education. Her recent work includes Beyond Access: Transforming Policy and Practice [Page xxii]for Gender Equality in Education (co-edited with Sheila Aikman) and Gender, Schooling and Global Social Justice (2006).

Linda M. von Hoene is the Director of the Graduate Student Instructor Teaching and Resource Center at the University of California, Berkeley. She received her PhD in German from the University of California, Berkeley, with a dissertation entitled, ‘Fascism and Female Subjectivity: The Lure of Fascism for the Female Subject in Psychoanalytic Theory, German Literature and Film’. She has published articles and book chapters on the intersection of second language acquisition and feminist, psychoanalytic and post-colonial theory. She is currently co-authoring a book with colleagues at Berkeley on instructional design and student motivation that will be published by Cambridge University Press.

Valerie Walkerdine is Professor of Psychology in the School of Social Sciences, Cardiff University. She has published extensively, including Mass Hysteria: CriticalPsychology and Media Studies (with L. Blackman), Challenging Subjects: Critical Psychology for a New Millennium, and Growing up Girl: Gender and Class in the 21st Century (with H. Lucey and J. Melody). Her latest book on children, relationality and multimedia will be published by Palgrave in 2006. Her current research focuses on neo-liberalism and subjectivity, and subjectivities and work identities in transition in South Wales and Sydney. She is also working toward a theory of relationality. Valerie is founding editor of the International Journal ofCritical Psychology.

Janie Victoria Ward, EdD, is an Associate Professor of Education and Human Services, and Chair of the Africana Studies Department at Simmons College in Boston, Massachusetts. She is Co-Principal Investigator (with Wendy Luttrell, Harvard Graduate School of Education) of Project ASSERT (Accessing Strengths and Supporting Effective Resistance in Teaching), a participatory research study designed to explore cultural beliefs and presuppositions that underlie discourses of gender, race and class expressed by adults working with urban youth. The author of four books, and many chapters and articles, Janie's research interests focus on the psychosocial development of African-American children and youth.

Michelle Webber is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Brock University. She researches and publishes in the areas of feminist pedagogy, gender and higher education. Her teaching subjects include sociology of education, qualitative research methods, sociology of gender and introductory sociology. With co-editor Kate Bezanson, she has published Rethinking Society in the 21st Century:Critical Readings in Sociology (Canadian Scholars Press, 2004). Her current research focuses on the regulation of academics through disciplinary mechanisms such as merit pay and the tenure process.

[Page xxiii]Michael L. Wehmeyer, PhD, is Professor of Special Education; Director, Kansas University Center on Developmental Disabilities; and Associate Director, Beach Center on Disability, all at the University of Kansas. Dr Wehmeyer is engaged in teacher personnel preparation in the area of severe, multiple disabilities, and directs multiple federally funded projects conducting research and model development in the education of students with intellectual and developmental disabilities. He is the author of more than 170 articles or book chapters and has authored, co-authored or co-edited 19 books on disability and education-related issues, including issues pertaining to self-determination, transition, universal design for learning and access to the general curriculum for students with significant disabilities, gender equity and students with intellectual disabilities, and technology use by persons with cognitive disabilities. He is past-president of the Council for Exceptional Children's Division on Career Development and Transition and is editor-in-chief of the journal Remedial and Special Education.

Gaby Weiner is currently Honorary Professor at Edinburgh University. Her previous posts included Professor of Teacher Education and Research at Umeâ University in Sweden (1998–2005) and Professor of Educational Research (1992–98) at South Bank University, London. She has written and edited a number of publications on social justice, gender, race and ethnicity, including Feminisms in Education (1994), Equal Opportunities in Colleges and Universities (with M. Farish, J. McPake and J. Powney, 1995), Closing the Gender Gap: Postwar Educational and Social Change (with M. Arnot and M. David, 1999), and, most recently, Kids in Cyberspace: Teaching Antiracism Using the Internet in Britain, Spain and Sweden (with C. Gaine, 2005). She is also responsible for two book series: Gender and Education (with R. Deem) and Feminist Educational Thinking (with L. Yates and K. Weiler). She is currently completing a book on the uses of auto/biography to educational research.

Michelle D. Young is the Executive Director of the University Council for Educational Administration (UCEA) and a faculty member in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis at the University of Missouri-Columbia. Her scholarship focuses on the preparation and practice of school leaders and school policies that facilitate equitable and quality experiences for all students and adults who learn and work in schools. Young is the recipient of the William J. Davis award for the most outstanding article published in a volume of the Educational Administration Quarterly. Her work has also been published in the Review of Educational Research, the Educational Researcher, the American Educational Research Journal, the Journal of School Leadership, the International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, and Leadership and Policy in Schools, among other publications.